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Fly Fishing with Doug Macnair:
Excerpts from The Fly Cast:
Concepts & Comments^©

By Doug Macnair

 

Introduction

 

Over the last decade, I've frequently received questions dealing with the fly cast, usually from folks new to the sport who find making a decent cast difficult at best. However, a surprising number have stemmed from long-time fly fishers who, having never mastered the cast, simply made do

 

Believing that folks called to the gentle art should be able to fly cast, I sat down and wrote a manuscript on fly casting. After extensive research into what the experts offer, I found, what I believed to be, areas where descriptions of "how to do it" could be clarified or said another way. When I was finished, I believed the work contained enough new thoughts to warrant its publication; Unfortunately, I was told that fly fishing is a "niche" sport, and unless I was willing to front somewhere between 15K and 20K, publishers said the gamble wasn't worth it. The truth is I didn't then, and don't now, have that kind of money.

 

I did, however, have clients-clients who believed that I could give them a head start in developing their fly casting abilities. But regardless of what I was able to have a student achieve over a 2-day period, without immediate practice the age-old problem of the learning curve set in quickly.

 

To minimize the effects of the learning curve, I created a booklet of basics taken from the book, The Fly Cast: Concepts & Comments. I call it, Excerpts. Each of my students receive this booklet along with these rather explicit instructions:

 

Excerpts should be carried with you outside during practice sessions. (The booklet I issue is spiral bound for ease of page reference.) Whenever you make a mistake, quit casting and refer to the booklet. To continue casting without referring to the book is stupid-you are doing nothing but reinforcing error.

 

In offering this work to you, the interested fly fisher, these instructions apply. I am pleased to offer these basic techniques to you without cost or obligation, save one: I expect you to protect my copyright. Print out Excepts and enjoy.

 

Thanks to Adobe and especially Adobe Reader, I will soon offer the complete The Fly Cast: Concepts & Comments, on the Internet as an e-Book using Adobe's PDF format for easy download.

 

For now, read on, print out, practice, and become a competent fly fisher.

 

Douglas G. Macnair

 

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